Well just thought id give some feedback...

We live in a large rural community with only one road in, and one road out... it just so happens that this is a long, windy and fairly narrow road with some rather large inclines, and declines...

I have an 04 expedition fitted with brand new snow tires which are studded and awesome!... my Expo is only 2WD though.... we got stuck in it 2 days ago while trying to get down the hill, only some help from a few friends allowed me to get some traction and build up a head of steam to turn around and go back home! Rear wheel drive is always going to be contentious simply as it doesn't have the weight over the drive wheels... still, that said, my Expo is an animal on normal snow!...

I decided to give the Audi a try on its new Blizzaks.... Holy scchhhmmmoooookes! it absolutely rocks!... i was goign up the hill behind an industrial tow truck, dually rear wheels, all snow chained up... it was fish tailing all over the place and eventually had to give up! The TT just tip toed around it and kept going.... i have to say, we have a plethora of conditions, sheet ice, snow drifts, powder snow, compact snow, deep snow etc... the TT has been immaculate and has outperformed a lot of more expensive cars..... People were giving me some funny looks in a small sports coupe... there smiles soon turned to dismay as i trundled past their abandoned 4x4 like a mountain goat! haha....

I have used it all day and it has been superb, obviously there are issues when the snow gets heavy, and turning can be quite fun! but as for grip - either accelerating or hard breaking, the TT is great and i would recommend from my experiences that it is pretty harcore... i think the short wheel base, the quattro drive train and hardcore Blizzak tires makes for a very potent winter car!

 

hahaha! where are you? I am at Redmond and I haven't had the chance to venture out yet. Going to go try tomorrow though.

 

drsmith...you are most encouraging. thank you!

i live in the mountains north of boise and we have about a foot on the ground. i too live rural (2.5 miles of dirt from driveway to highway) and it is killing me seeing our new-to-us '05 225 Quattro sitting in the driveway looking like a white chocolate bon bon. i don't have Blizzaks yet just Continentals...don't remember the model since i barely got the car home from having both headlight assemblies replaced when the snow hit hard last weekend. our roads have been plowed and aren't terribly slick. we are going to dig her out and see if we can get from our house to the highway. if so, we are going for a drive!! we have some off camber inclines which sort of freak me out but i think it is worth a shot to see what happens.

 

I have to agree that the tt is capable in the snow, though tires make all the difference. On my past tt I had blizzaks, they rocked, i have these stupid general snow tires now, and they just dont have comprable lateral stability, though I got home last night despite **** roads just fine, just lower speeds then I like. The car seems to wag at really above 35 in much snow, though the ESP doesnt kick in, so its nothing severe, with my suspesion set up (fsd,eibach pro, f&r neuspeed sways, 20+25mm spacers), I can almost feel the road too well for winter driving haha, you can detect all the little pulls and pushes goign through snow. All said though, as much as I love the TT, it just doesnt compare to the A4 I used to have, I do prefer torsen for awd, even over the gf's subaru.

 

Sooo...today we dug the TT out...defrosted it and took it for a test drive with the summer tires on our severely radical snowy, icy road. Suffice to say I'm shocked and awed by what I discovered...ZERO and I mean ZERO slippage.

We took the TT to town and put a set of Blizzacks (LW25s) on it. Spendy but worth it. DH drove it to town and I followed in my behemoth SUV. She sailed out of here which shocked the DH since he was more of a wimp that me when it comes to driving her on these roads. I was slipping and sliding in the ute in 4Low with aggressive studded snow tires.

When I drove the TT home (DH drove the ute) it was amazing...I was haulin' a$$ on the snowy road and it didn't slip once.

Looks like I have my winter car and can put the ute away and save it for miserable driving days.

 

I gotta get pics up. We got a pretty good snow last night (live in the same area as Random), while my car did float a little bit, just like he said, I let it go where it needed to, and drive home at almost normal road speeds. My driveway is where it got fun. I had snow plowing up onto the hood, and blasting into the engine compartment via fresh air duct enough to completely coat the drivers side of the engine. She kept truckin until the snow started reducing airflow thru my air filter, but fortunately, I was almost at my parking space by then.

I'm on year old Continental ContiExtremeContacts, set up with some pretty aggressive camber, so tread depth on the inner edges of the tires is not what it should be. No traction problems though.

 

Snow is awesome! If you want the best snow tires, talk to verdstien. They make a tire with ground-up walnut shell impregnated in the rubber. These are performance tires with the best grip surface possible. Also, the walnut shell doesn't dig grooves in the road or wear down like studs.

 

I don't have personal experience in the snow with mine, but a good friend of mine has been driving up to Tahoe and Mammoth several times a year with his TT with Blizzaks. He's told me a couple of times the TT was the only non-SUV that made it up to the top.

 

Well it seems that can of worms was well worth opening! haha...

I am nothing but impressed with the TT, the beauty of its set up is that due to its short wheel base when it does slide and slip, mainly going around corners, it is very predictable and very controllable....

There were still SUV's and other cars strewn across the highways, add to that some 50mph winds and it makes for a tasty weekend! haha...

Here are some pics taken in the first few hours a few days ago...





The Blizzaks are great! but its the quattro and short wheel base that is the big winner...

One thing i will say, i am English and the state of driving here in WA is absolutely terrible! In dry conditions people tailgate and make stupid moves, but in the rain they continue to do so as if their 'Soccer Mom' mobile can defy the laws of physics... and when the snow is here, the roads are icy, you can actually see cars sliding into ditches and cars going out of control and yet i still find myself with someone riding my *** within 6 feet of my rear bumper!..... i just don't get it, its completely retarded and makes no sense. It got to the point where i had to stop, get out of my car and tell the *** hole behind me to back off or else he is shortly going to find an Audi 4 ring emblem permanently engraved into his balding slap head!..... I guess it coming out in an English Accent gives it more weight haha...

But seriously, why do people do it?!

 

that.... is... AWESOME.


Anyway, the way I see it, there is no driving instruction in the US. If you can keep it between the lines (sometimes), and know the difference between a green and red light (sometimes), they'll let you drive.

We need to adopt the driving programs of europe. Germany's is the one I'm most familiar with, and it requires that you actually know something about driving, and your car. GOOD!